If you want to immediately feel uncool, step out of the limo and realize that the entire collective of photographers has looked you over, realized you’re no one that’s going to deserve a spot on WireImage.com after the event and instantly dismissed you before turning their gaze on the next arriving limousine.

This was the scene outside of the Kodak preceding the American Film Institute’s 33rd Annual Life Achievement Awards.

Still, we pressed on, walking down the carpet like we deserved to be there, fully aware that all of the press was focused on the night’s recipient, George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg, and the other luminaries who were on the carpet the same time as us.

I’d attended the last three AFI shows—the 30th show, for Tom Hanks, was the first real event I covered for the site three years ago; the 31st was for Robert DeNiro, and last year’s dinner, the 32nd annual, feted Meryl Streep. So this year’s event would be the first that honored a director (since I’d been going, anyway), and it’d be the first time I sat down on the floor itself, amongst all the celebrities, sponsors and Playmates. And while celebrations for Tom Hanks or Meryl Streep could gloss over lesser movies like TURNER & HOOCH or SHE-DEVIL, George Lucas doesn’t exactly have as many movies as John Ford in his resume. Which meant… HOWARD THE DUCK clips? We shall see.

The thing about these events is, they really remind you of why you love the movies. Really, they’re not like “awards” shows, which can feel like exclusionary, self-congratulatory affairs at times. Rather, these honorings are more celebrations of movies and of the lifetimes of work that go into them. So it took all of five minutes before I felt like a ten-year-old again. Inside the room, there was a steady flow of John Williams music playing, and if you can sit through a dinner while the music from the Cantina scene in EP. IV is playing and not get into the spirit of things, well, you’re a steekin’ Sith, obviously.

I’d met Lucas one time previously, at the Playboy Mansion, of all places. That night, George had his “game face” on, and wasn’t exactly looking to talk to people that hadn’t posed on the pages of Hef’s magazine:

The man isn’t exactly known for his jovial nature in interviews, either, so I was expecting a kind of solemn toasting to his accomplishments. Harrison Ford was one of the folks who’d be raising a glass in George’s honor, and he’s not really known for having any inflection when he speaks off-camera, either, so… well, this could be a solemn, staid affair.

It became evident that it wasn’t going to be this way with the person who opened the show—Shatner.

How else do you open a tribute to the guy who created STAR WARS? Yep, you invite William Shatner out. Bill, who is so much more likable since he fully embraced his cheesy side, opened with a few nice words about STAR TREK… which he quickly changed to STAR WARS when threatened by a couple Stormtroopers who took the stage. Shatner then paid tribute in the best way he knew how—by singing a Shatnerized version of Sinatra’s “My Way,” with lyrics tailored to Lucas. The song culminated in Bill and a half-dozen Stormtroopers doing a kick-step dance routine, before the Troopers picked him up and carried him off-stage.

The tone was clear once Sir Howard Stringer took the stage, so once even he gently ribbed Lucas, we were off and running.

The format of the show is similar to past shows, with a chronological celebration of the honoree’s films. So Robert Duvall took the stage and introduced George’s first movie, THX-1138. I’ve never seen the movie (I’ll correct that fact soon, thanks to the gift bag’s inclusion of all of George’s flicks on DVD), so I don’t know how much of the clips were original and which of them were “fixed” for the Special Edition DVD release earlier this year. But either way, it looks like a very accomplished, if cold, first effort, especially for the time period in which it was made, the pre-CGI early ‘70s.

Richard Dreyfuss talked up AMERICAN GRAFITTI, a movie that inspired everything from HAPPY DAYS to ’50s-themed restaurants. But enough… this wasn’t what we were all there to celebrate (as much as it does deserve celebrating). Bring on the STAR WARS tribute!

With Chewbacca in the audience (and Peter Mayhew under the fur for this night, too), Mark Hamill took the stage and offered a reverential speech. Which would be in direct contrast to both Carrie Fisher’s and also Harrison Ford’s, which followed. First, Fisher, always clever with her words, gave George a mostly profane tribute (of a sort), ribbing George for his generally expressionless demeanor, and the fact that he owns her likeness to such a degree that she owes him cash every time she looks in the mirror.

Harrison Ford then came up and offered a clear example of why it’s a bad idea to have a few too many drinks before taking the stage to give a speech. I will say, he was more animated than I’ve seen him in a while, but it’ll be interesting to see if the editors can make his rambling a bit more coherent when the program airs on USA (Monday, June 20, at 9 PM).

Ford did talk about how he wasn’t Lucas’s first choice for Han Solo or Indiana Jones, even after working with George in AMERICAN GRAFITTI, but that he’s still willing to work with him again—he’s waiting to do INDY IV, but that it better happen soon (we all agree with him here). After he (finally) stopped talking, he, Hamill, Fisher, and R2D2 and C3PO all took the stage and recreated the award ceremony of EPISODE IV. The scene played on a big screen overhead, making for a pretty cool photo opportunity. Except for the fact that the onscreen Princess Leia wasn’t flipping off Lucas like the real-life Carrie Fisher. I know Fisher’s got a wicked sense of humor, but her timing here was a bit off.

When Lucas took the stage at the end, he was more jovial and self-deprecating than usual. About INDY IV, he did say that he does plan to get on that and hopefully get things moving in the fall. He also talked about the influence of producer Francis Ford Coppola, who took a guy who couldn’t write a movie script at all to where he is now, “the king of wooden dialogue.”

Throughout the night, HOWARD THE DUCK was given very short shrift, but then again, in comparison to the movies mentioned before, so was the new trilogy.

The thing that became evident to me throughout the night—well, more evident—is that all the carping about EPISODES I-III (really, people have taken all kinds of shots at Lucas since the Ewoks) misses the bigger point—Lucas has changed all of our lives, everyone who grew on the original trilogy, for the better.

Is there any other movie that, no matter how many times you see it, where the opening strains of the film’s score give you the chills? And can take you back to your childhood just as easily? Whatever flaws the man might have as a filmmaker, they’re so far outweighed by his contributions to, really, the world (his contributions to sound engineering, cameras, special effects and digital filmmaking are another conversation entirely, and no less important). This night was a remembrance of just what Lucas has meant to movies, and science fiction movies in particular, as well as to all of us who will carry affection for these movies forever.

A couple nights later, I put in EPISODE IV, a DVD of the original movie, not the Special Editions, and was 10 years old all over again.

Next Week: Nick Hornby’s latest, A LONG WAY DOWN.

/chris

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